1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a knee air bag for a vehicle, which is provided in front of a seat of the vehicle to be deployed in the event of a collision, thus protecting a passenger's knees.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, as the interest given to safety in the event of a vehicle collision has increased, a vehicle has been equipped with various air bags to effectively protect a passenger during the vehicle collision.
Among the air bags, as one example, a knee air bag has been proposed. However, the knee air bag has not been widely installed in vehicles, in comparison with other air bags.
Thus, recently, a lot of research into the knee air bag has been made, but there has not yet been proposed a knee air bag whose shape and structure are designed in consideration of relations between the knee air bag and other air bags.
The knee air bag is generally deployed around the lower part of a passenger's body to protect his or her knees in the event of a collision. The upper part of the passenger's body is protected by a center air bag or a roof air bag. Thus, in order to reliably protect the upper part of the passenger's body and his or her knees, the layout of the knee air bag with respect to the roof air bag or the like when the knee air bag is deployed must be considered.
For example, referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, as for the rear seat of a vehicle, in the event of a collision, a roof air bag 10 is deployed to protect the head and chest of a passenger P, while a knee air bag 30 is deployed at a lower position to protect the knees of the passenger P. However, the two air bags are simultaneously deployed, so that the upper end of the knee air bag 30 is pressed against the lower end of the roof air bag 10, and thus the roof air bag 10 may excessively protrude towards the passenger P. This causes the twisting of his or her neck, thus undesirably increasing secondary injuries.
Such an increase in secondary injuries occurs for the following reason. That is, when the knee air bag 30 is deployed, an inflator explodes and simultaneously a cushion of the air bag is excessively deployed towards the passenger P, so that the roof air bag 10 located at an upper position is pushed by the knee air bag 30 and is excessively deployed towards the passenger P. Thus, when the knee air bag 30 is applied in the same manner as the conventional air bag, it has a problem in that secondary injuries increase. Therefore, there is required a knee air bag having an optimum shape and structure which can reduce the injuries and minimize interference with another bag to allow the two air bags to sufficiently display their effects.
The information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.